Humble

As I have been growing in my faith, a few things have happened. I have become happier and more fulfilled of course, and I have also learned alot on how to read the bible and how to apply it not only in my everyday life, but how to relate things from the old testament to the new. Its been so amazing. I have also read alot of other books by authors like John Piper, RC Sproul, John MacArthur, Mattie Montgomery, JI Packer and many more. Expanding not only my knowledge of scripture, but how to use scripture in most aspects of my life.

But, and this is a bit but, I have become very hardened and cocky with what I have become. Mark Driscol says that every new Calvinist should be locked in a room for five years after they become reformed. I could not agree more. Without my knowledge I became very confrontational and cocky about what my theology is. I was starting fights on social media networks, with friends, and even with family on what I perceived as the true way to teach, learn, evangelize, and even love God. And all of this happened without my knowledge!

Last night, after my wife came home, she took me aside and spoke to me about these things. I was floored by this, I could not believe that my wife was confronting me about my theology! And let me tell you, I fought it tooth and nail all the way to the end, I even went as far as questioning her faith and love! Horrible right? Well I went outside to essentially get away from the argument, but while I was out there I began to pray.

An amazing thing happened. I became so humbled. I was shown that I was running with the sin of pride, and running it quite fast. I sat out there, in front of my apartment just broken down by the Holy Spirit.

When I came inside I could tell that my wife was ready for round two. But as I sat down on the couch and I took her hand in mine, I told her that she was right. And she was, and is right about the whole situation. I know for a fact that God put her there in that place at that time to tell me these things and to humble me and put my sin on display for me to see and work through it. Its like I told my pastor this morning, its a wonderful thing to know that the Holy Spirit is in me and working in me, but it is so glorious to see it at work in another person, not just for their benefit, but for mine!!

So, it is such a breathtaking fact that even though i have been justified through Christ, I live my life being sanctified, giving glory to God and doing all things for him. I have alot to learn, and alot of growing to do, I am just so honored to have a loving wife to pick me up when I am down and talk to me, and my Lord, my King, my God to take off the lense that clouds my vision, and show me the biblical lense that shows the amazing work and sacrifice that he gave with Jesus Christ on the cross. It left me speechless, that's why i had to type it! God bless

Blind

I just had to write about this. Last night i went to a concert with some people i am close with, the show was Head, Project 86, Spoken. The Wedding, and I Am Empire. All the bands put on an amazing performance and we all had a great time, and I know for a fact that God was showing not only me things about my life, but other people as well.
Now as i have said before, i used to be quite the party, sinning, not caring guy ( used to be ), and one of the bands that i used to listen to and in a way model alot of my behavior by was the group called Korn. They were mine and my friends rowdy music that we would get drunk and all other kinds of junk and just be very foolish.
The song that always got to me was the song "blind". The song was heavy and angry and full of anger and angst, which i was as well. So this became like our "party anthem."
So back to the concert; Head was the main act on the bill, and as many of you know he was the lead guitar player and backing vocals for the band Korn. His story and testimony is amazing if you haven't heard it or read it yet you really should. Anyway, he started out with a couple old Korn songs, which was odd to me but it really fit in line with the story that he was telling with his transformation to the man he is today.
But then halfway into his set he started a medley of songs from Korn and there was no vocals, but then out of nowhere he broke into the song "blind".
At first this was not a problem, i was getting down, enjoying a song that i have known for a long time, but then half way through the song i almost got into the mosh pit ( till i realized that i am to old and fat for that!)
Then sitting on the outside of the pit a wave of emotions just poured down on me, just guilt and shame and sorrow for the things that i did while listening to this song in the past. It was so bad that i had to go outside by myself and calm down.
While i was out there, sitting by my car with my head in my hands, i just began praising God and thanking him for taking me from that horrible sinful hell-bound life that i was so enthralled in, His grace, mercy, and love alone took me from the wretched, lost, self-destructive sinner I was then and transformed me into the God loving, God fearing, God centered man I am today.
And that was not all!
After all the bands played, the pastor from the church came up and started talking, he had us clear a path for people to "come on down!" Kind of shoving the prosperity gospel at these kids, which i don't really agree with, but it was the way he does his thing i guess. Anyway after that he apparently hit a nerve with my buddy Aaron, he started talking about how alot of Christian's have lost their way and this is a pivotal moment and if they wanted to come up and re-dedicate their life to Christ, they would help with that. Now this was in a sense just another form of the prosperity gospel, but it touched my friend and he took the walk.
Now on the way home I followed all up on the things that he heard at the service that night, not wanting him to be confused about the message that was out there. And he listened and seemed to really get it and enjoy it. So long story short, he is going to church with me this Sunday and i really pray and hope in all sincerness and love that he stays with it.
So anyway, last night was such a fun night of music, family, and friends. And the way that God showed up and showed me how far He has taken me was just spectacular.
I just wanted to share that, so God bless the bands that were there, they all have their stories and if you have time go check the bands out and see what they have going on. God bless my buddy Aaron, its good to have you on the team :). And God bless my bro Bob and his little boy Benny who rocked it at his first show ever, i couldn't have imagined a better time with a couple better dudes.

Job 5

I just wanted to write about this because God really moved in my life today. I will start at the end and then go back a little bit. Just a little bit ago i felt the need to read a book in the bible, and God pointed me to Job 5. This is the whole thing just in case you don't have a bible handy.

“Call now; is there anyone who will answer you?

To which of vthe holy ones will you turn?

2 Surely vexation kills the fool,

and jealousy slays the simple.

3 wI have seen the fool taking root,

but suddenly I cursed his dwelling.

4 His children are xfar from safety;

they are crushed in ythe gate,

and there is no one to deliver them.

5 The hungry eat his harvest,

and he takes it even out of thorns,1

and the thirsty pant2 after his3 wealth.

6 For affliction does not come from the dust,

nor does trouble sprout from the ground,

7 but man is zborn to trouble

as the sparks fly upward.

8 “As for me, I would seek God,

and to God would I commit my cause,

9 who adoes great things and bunsearchable,

cmarvelous things without number:

10 he gives drain on the earth

and sends waters on the fields;

11 he esets on high those who are lowly,

and those who mourn are lifted to safety.

12 He ffrustrates the devices of the crafty,

so that their hands achieve no success.

13 He gcatches the wise in their own craftiness,

and the schemes of the wily are brought to a quick end.

14 They meet with darkness in the daytime

and hgrope at noonday as in the night.

15 But he isaves the needy from the sword of their mouth

and from the hand of the mighty.

16 So the poor have hope,

and jinjustice shuts her mouth.

17 “Behold, kblessed is the one whom God reproves;

therefore ldespise not the discipline of the mAlmighty.

18 For he wounds, but he nbinds up;

he oshatters, but his hands heal.

19 He will pdeliver you from six troubles;

in seven no qevil4 shall touch you.

20 rIn famine he will redeem you from death,

and in war from the power of the sword.

21 You shall be shidden from the lash of the tongue,

and shall not fear destruction when it comes.

22 At destruction and famine you shall laugh,

and shall not fear tthe beasts of the earth.

23 For you shall be in league with the stones of the field,

and the beasts of the field shall be at peace with you.

24 You shall know that your utent is at peace,

and you shall inspect your fold and miss nothing.

25 You shall know also that your voffspring shall be many,

and your descendants as wthe grass of the earth.

26 You shall come to your grave in xripe old age,

like a sheaf gathered up in its season.

27 Behold, this we have ysearched out; it is true.

Hear, and know it for your good.”

Now this really spoke to me. Its a reality that i am coming to find that when you get closer and deeper into your theology and scripture of the Gospel, the devil comes at you harder and harder every time. Today was a prime example of this. Now this week has been a big one for me, i started going to a new church, and so far it is a great place so I am very stoked about that. Got to spend some good time with my brother Mason and that is always a good time with just friendship and fellowship. And today i got to go have some coffee with the pastor from this new church! Just awesome things happening all by the grace of God.

But after all this I am home alone with my son Eli and there are some guys outside fixing the balconies on the apartment to get them ready for painting. Well as anyone knows, that kind of work is quite noisy and annoying, so to make a long story short, they woke Eli up from a much needed nap. And i got so angry! Enraged, just vile spitting hatred for these guys who are just doing there job, and doing a very thorough and fast job of it. But i didn't care, it was so hard not to run out there and throw mass amounts of gravel at them while telling them how mad they have actually made me. By the grace of God i refrained from doing this, but what i did in my heart was not any better. The bible says if you have hatred towards another person you have murdered them in your heart, so BOOM, broke a commandment, broke it big time.

So later i am sitting here feeding Eli his dinner, praying and repenting of my sin that i committed and just farting around on the computer when I grabbed my bible i just got in the mail today. I felt God wanted me to open it and he pointed me to the book of Job. Chapter 5 to be exact. I read that and it was a good thing I was already sitting down because it knocked me for a loop! Talk about humbling and really putting all this into perspective!! So i of course, with tears in my eyes in awe of the absolute power and grace of God, spent the next ten to fifteen minutes just praising, repenting and glorifying God.

What i am getting at here, is no matter what God loves you. He wants you to become the person he created you to be. Jesus became man and walked this earth, tempted by every sin we have been and more, he bore our punishment, took our judgment of the wrath of God, lived a sinless life and died for all of our sins. And if you repent, believe in this, pick up your cross and follow Him, you will live in eternal life and happiness. Jesus was in a way the second Adam, and when we become believers in His word and love, He sees us like Jesus. If that is not a complete life altering revelation, I don't know what could be.

school days

Well i am a full-time college student now, and I actually really like it. I really feel like i am bettering myself and actually getting somewhere in life......finally!! But one thing has been really getting me down about the whole experience. Now i know i will always be confronted with issues like this throughout my life, but, the complete misuse or just flat out mockery and disrespect of God and the bible is almost more than i can take. Now i do what i can do to spread my view, my life, my God's word. I talk to people who are close and seem interested in what i have to offer, most of the time to scoffing or changing of the subject. But as i sit in the library doing homework, or walking to my next class, or even in class itself, its just so sad to see the confusion and the lost and the hurt people around me. And it's everywhere! The students, the teachers, even the college textbooks! All heretic shells of a figure that was supposed to be made in the image of God! The complete disregard and language that would make a sailor step back is mind blowing to me. I pray every night that i can go through a day without a GD bomb or overhearing someone making fun of a christian and stopping right away when i come strolling up in my NOTW t-shirt. I even have a teacher that told me that i can write about anything i want for my essay just as long as i wasn't beating her over the head with a bible or handing tracts out to her! This is not the world that God wanted. There are so many warning signs, so many chances that He gives to the walking dead, to make them come to life again and be welcomed into the most loving and caring family and have everlasting life through His grace and His life. But people are so clouded with modern society and modern evils that they are so self-absorbed and selfish and hateful that they wont even give it a thought. As a a matter of fact they become enraged! So just vile-spitting angry at the message or the messenger. It breaks my heart at times to know that i was once wearing that same disguise, to hide myself from the truth, from the light, from God Himself. But every night, when i was alone, i had to take that disguise off and look at myself in the mirror, and no matter how many times i told myself i was happy, i was lying. I was so unhappy, so alone, so scared and self destructive that i never thought that anything could fill that hole. Then i started listening. I finally stopped. I lay, broken wide open and the Lord God himself came and filled me up with his spirit, His grace, His word, His love! I have not been the same since. And i know that i was in the same place as, at least alot, of these people that i come into contact with. I just pray that maybe they see me, hear me, understand me, so i can be some sort of a gateway to God and his love. I pray for the strength to have the right words when those situations arise so i don't misuse or misquote anything that God has taught me. Anyway i just really feel like i had to get that off of my chest and talk a bit. If you read this whole thing, thank you. And if you feel the same way, hit me up! Maybe we can chat and pray and try to figure out some kind of a game plan. God bless.

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growing

Well, I have just returned from evangelizing at the University of Oregon with my brother in law Mason and our brother in Christ Keith. It was so amazing! Now this is the third time i have went to do this and i have been reflecting on this on how much not only my faith but my confidence has grown not just through this outreach, but through my home life and my relationship with God himself. When I first started going to the U of O I was so intimidated and nervous that i maybe talked to one person and handed out like 5 tracts, and that's being very generous. The second time i probably doubled my attempts from before, woo hoo! But man, today i had a hand on my shoulder, and i know it was Christs hand leading me. I was amazed how confident i was. We all were! God's blessing was there with us today for sure!! It is the most amazing feeling in the world to do the work of God, with his blessing, with amazing people that i do all of this with! I really think that with the grace of God that we really touched some people and planted some seeds that i pray grow full and chock full of good fruit. From the white board, tract hand-outs, open air ( which Mason always does and blows me away every time ), and just the conversations that we had with just about everyone who came by us today.........mind blowing. Thank the Lord for this mind and heart that He has givin me to open my eyes to this broken dark world i live in and not only give it meaning, but give us a voice and the truth of the gospel to " combat " the giants in this land. Glory to God, my hero, my lord, my savior!!!!!!

first time

So the other day i was watching my 9 month old Eli eating a apple for the first time. As i watched him hold it experiencing the textures and feel of the apple, placing it in his mouth and tasting the apple for the very first time and watched his eyes and expressions as he learned that it was good tasting and good. He even looked at me and his mother like " is this ok? " It was awesome. What this reminds me of is my own story of a rebirth in my Christian life. After i accepted God into my life and became " born-again ", its as if i am experiencing things for the first time, enjoying it, tasting it, looking around at people asking if this is ok. Simple normal everyday things that i would do on a any normal day have gotten so much more meaning now that i have the Lord to experience it with! I have come to learn that this is a form of christian hedonism, enjoying Christ with everything i do. He has opened my eyes to such happiness and joy that i could never fathom happening in my life. I mean i am not going to lie, there were times in my life before i was saved that i did experience happiness, but it cannot hold a candle to the happiness that i have shared with God. Just the other day i experienced this and it was so amazing. For awhile now we have been having long nights because my son Eli is cutting his teeth and is having a hard time sleeping, so in turn we have been having a hard time sleeping lol. So while i was laying there trying to be as quiet as i can i have been not just praying, but having conversations with God. Praising, praying, listening, enjoying the time. I kept asking for help with my anger issues and how to get to the bottom of it and find the root problem that makes it happen almost every day. Now i did this for a few days and nothing was happening but i didn't stop talking to Him. Then the other day, out of no where. I wasn't even thinking about it or anything.......the answer and solution just popped in my head! And my first reaction was to argue it, my selfish behavior came into play right off the bat. But it was almost like a slap in the face to wake up! To see my shortcoming, my selfish self centered attitude towards this. God spoke directly to me and helped me. And i have never felt better about that situation, my life, my marriage, my faith! So that was me enjoying my first taste of a " apple ".

my testimony

Well here it goes, my first blog. And it's my blog so i can do what i want right? Ha! OK so i am going to do what i have not really done yet to or for anyone. I am going to do my testimony. Alright well my name is Max Beebout and i have finally been saved by the grace and Glory of the Lord God through his son Jesus Christ. But for most of my life that was not the case what-so-ever. I was so angry for most of my life; angry at myself, angry at the world, and angry at God himself. My real father was killed when i was like 6 months old from a drug deal gone bad. I don't remember the man at all, i was way to young when he was taken from me and my mother and his family. My mother married a man named Kelly when i was like a year year and a half old. Pretty fast right? He was a awful man. Full of anger and rage and he took it out on me and my mother for years and years. Everything from physical abuse with beatings and no remorse. Mental abuse from wanting to call me by my real fathers name William. And even sexual abuse towards me which i will not go into. And now as the man i am now i have forgiven him. But that was not the case before. First of all i was not told he wasn't my real father until i was 14. So i thought the behavior that happened before that date is just what fathers did to their sons and i never questioned it, even tho it hurt so bad every time. Also around that time of 14 is when i started rebelling against everything. Now i had went to church alot as a child with my mom and my grandpa but it almost seemed like a chore more than anything else. But as soon as i found out that most of my life had been a lie to that point i just became angry and lashed out with drugs alcohol and violence. I just didn't care. My mother finally left Kelly when i was like 17 and i thought that life was going to be easier. Not until that point did i realize that she was a raging alcoholic and it really took its horrible form at that point. Blind to the fact that i was in the same boat myself i judged her. I got in some trouble with the law and that still did not stop me. I continued down my spiral and still didn't care about anything. I moved out and began a life of pure sin. Drinking, drugs, blasphemy....you name it. I got married and had a son named Gage. Got divorced, which made I went into more self destruction. I went through weeks and weeks of binge drinking, its a surprise i didn't die. I ended up meeting the woman i would end up marrying in the middle of my destruction Shawnee. She did everything she could to get me out of my disease but i wouldn't listen. I was to bitter and again.....i didn't care. Then i almost lost her. I drank alot and lied to her face about it and made her apologize to me. I got caught the next day. I didn't even come clean myself! So ( thank God for this ) she kicked me out of our house. Which i know now was a sin right there of us sharing a house together without being married!! And man i went for it again. She is the best thing that ever happened to me and i screwed it up by drinking?? So what did i do? Drank even more! I moved from couch to couch and finally ended up at a very good friends house. Jonathan you did more for me than you will ever know. I love you brother! So after weeks of fighting and pleading to come back and be with her, all the while not being able to figure out what i did and was continuing to do was my own fault. Its been what i have been doing for years. Then one day she picked up the phone, called me, told me she missed me, and wanted to see me. From that day i have not had a drop of booze. Two years now. We eventually patched things up and i moved back into our little apartment here in Winston. But we both knew something wasn't right. We even ended up getting pregnant, well she got pregnant but it was us :). Then we did it. We got married. Now i know i did everything backwards but i cant go back and change it now even though i wish i could. Well we have a son together and his name is Eli and he is amazing. And we had our marriage dedicated to Christ. We have moved closer to Christ everyday and will continue to do so forever. I just got baptised this last Sunday and i am involved with the CORE evangelism group and i am doing everything i can to be a better man thought Christ. I owe my " transformation " if you will to alot of people. But mostly to Adam Crowl, Mason Goodknight, Moogie :), Ryan Steffenson, Bob Steffenson, my beautiful and amazing wife Shawnee Beebout and most importantly God! So there it is. That's me and a summary of how i got saved and the process of me getting there. If you read this that's cool. If not that's cool as well. I wrote this for myself, it was a weight i had to get off my shoulders. Anyway, all if this all i have in my life would not be possible if it wasn't for the Most High. My Lord, my Hero, my King. My lord God. I love you Lord and thank you for saving a wretch like me! God bless you all.